Star Fox: The Chronicles of Midas
by KMBlackwell
Summary: An Earthbound orphan overcomes the obstacles of her disability while uncovering her past with the help of an unexpected friend and ally. Will Piper Wall discover a simple and imperfect past or is it a little more "inevitable" than she had expected? Discover strength in the most unlikely of places and family in small packages as these heroes take on Thanos in the Multiverse.
1. Intro

Every time it's the same dream. I'm cold, wet, alone, and completely dumbfounded. You know that feeling you get in the pit of your stomach after you do something really embarrassing in public? Or the moment you realize you left the blinds open while getting dressed? That feeling. It's not scary but under the right circumstances it could be problematic.

In this dream I am laying flat on my back looking straight up at the sky. I can't tell if my body is wet from sweating or from rain. It's not always raining in my dream. Sometimes isn't a cloud in the sky. But it is always nighttime, or at least its pretty dark. Either way, there is certainly no sunshine coming through.

I am hurt. I can tell because I can't move any part of my body. But I don't feel it. I don't feel anything. It kinda feels like I am more at peace rather than on the verge of death. I don't know why I am just laying there or where I am I'm just peacefully chillin'. But something starts to feel off. That feeling from before slowly turns to panic. Like the dreams you have when you're falling. Then there is this hot flash of light and laughing. Like a little animal laughing. A hyena? But like, smaller?

"I don't know doc. It's just weird. What do you think?"

"Two spoonful's of fruit loops and call me in the morning," a five-year-old responded from behind a pair of hollowed out frames.

Piper smiled as she slurped up milk from a plastic spoon.

"You are the best in the biz, truly. Where did you go to school again, Harvard?"

"Ha ha, Harvard can't handle me Ms. Piper," the boy laughed.

"And a sense of humor to boot, look out ladies," Piper patted his head before leaning back in her chair.

"Wall, Piper."

"That's me, wish me luck!"

"Get a dog! Get a dog!" the little boy shouted with excitement.

"Finish your breakfast, kiddo," Piper winked as she leaned back and clutched the wheels on her chair.

Today is the day. Today is the day Piper Wall ages out of the orphanage and into a cold world full of opportunities but lacking in funding for the ones in need. As a parting gift, the boys and girls club raised enough money from bake sales, toy drives, and street corners for Piper to pick out a service animal on her way out. The large disingenuous man calling her name was the public transit driver for the handicap bus. Piper gave a half smile as she rolled up to him with a pack in her lap.

The driver held the door open and the two of them made their way to the parked bus that blocked traffic in the parking lot adjacent to a coffee chain and torn-up pavement and traffic cones. The construction site was an ongoing project to make the area more accessible but only added to the mess of potholes and cracked sidewalks that always gave Piper a headache. She grunted as a wheel found itself wedged in a large gap in the concrete. Onlookers would think it was ironic as her sarcastic nature displayed a "how's my driving" bumper sticker on the back of her wheelchair.

The driver took a break from a Bluetooth headset and assisted her out of the chasm and onto the lift. The machine moved slowly making the moment much more glamourous as the driver let out a heavy sigh and grumble.

"Gee, any more pomp and circumstance and I think we'd be outdoing the Titanic," Piper attempted.

"Ha," the driver mumbled.

Piper was like that. She didn't like looking at all the bad things in the world. She only ever believed in the opportunity to do good. She was also vaguely aware that humans are human and certainly imperfect. But so was she and that's what made her feel comfort in chaos. It's when things are too perfect that she begins to feel uneasy. Sarcasm was her way of coping with stress, fear, anxiety, pain, death, all of the things humanity falls apart over. Truth is, she can't really recall a time she ever felt wholly perfect. Literally, she fell and bumped her head when she was younger and has no fucking clue who she is. The doctors found her in a hospital bed staring up at the fluorescent lights humming the tune to "Neon Moon".

The lift came to a screeching halt and Piper rolled forward while the driver secured her chair. She looked around and noticed a larger elderly man slumped over asleep. She narrowed her eyes and could swear she saw an eyepatch covering his right eye. But she couldn't be sure. Imperfect. Just as she liked it. She smirked.

"1830, departing," the driver mumbled into a receiver.

There was a distant rumbling of cars honking while Piper stared out the window across from where she was securely perched. Her hands were folded comfortably on top of her pack. The contents being photos of her time spent with the kids at the orphanage, letters, well wishes, and her favorite book. The binding had seen better days and the author's name was long ago scratched out on all sides of the green hardcover. Her fingers fumbled with the zipper of the pack as she pulled the book out to examine it.

Her hands traced the cover as if it were the first time she had ever seen it. Her mind was distracted, vacant, and yet present all at once. She was worried but fine upset but humble. There really was no right way to feel in this moment. She thought about the story in her hands. The adventure, the perilous journey presented by an unknown author. Piper couldn't help but put herself in the hero's shoes.

"What would Midas do?" she whispered.

Just as she opened the cover to being reading the book for the millionth time the bus jerked and skipped over a large orange cone in the road. Piper's pack flew off her lap and landed in the walkway out of her reach spilling its contents near the doorway. The old man in the back of the bus snorted loudly in his sleep. The driver swung the door open angrily and shouted profanities at a construction worker.

"Excuse me," Piper attempted to no avail as the driver preceded to exit the bus for a closer encounter.

She sighed heavily watching the shouting match unfold out the window behind her. Imperfect, but manageable.

She unbuckled herself from the wheelchair and used her arms to pull her upper body onto a row of empty seats next to her secured chair. She scrambled with her forearms to reach for a metal bar at the end of the row which fell just out of her reach.

"Shit," she strained.

Her gloved hands reached again, hungry for the pages of memories scattered about and blowing around the bus. She watched helplessly as a photograph fluttered out the door and into a sewer drain. She pushed her torso, hard, too hard, fuck.

Her hand slipped across the row of plastic seats as her body landed with a thud on the dirty floor of the bus. The added motion caused just enough of a draft to push the remaining contents out of the bus and into the chaos. Piper reached, defeated, toward the doorway as scribbles of well-wishes and happy memories floated down into the void. The shouting and profanities became distorted as her mind swirled into the vacant calm that often followed her chaos. She felt her body being lifted from behind but her mind was stuck somewhere between disbelief and familiarity. She heard a voice deep and menacing calling out to her but she didn't respond. She began to feel embarrassed again for trying too hard but then nearly panicking as she heard laughter coming from her rescuer.

"Shit, girl, you gonna get me fired," the driver had boarded the back of the bus and gathered up her pack and the green book on the chair next to Piper's wheelchair.

"I was just trying—"

"Yeah, well, people like you shouldn't try so hard," he mumbled as he assisted her back to her chair.

Piper nodded, blankly, while she buckled her seatbelt and held her pack, now nearly empty, tightly. The bus roared back to life as it continued its journey toward the animal shelter.

"Midas would have tried harder," she sighed.

The remainder of the trip was rather dull as the three of them, the musketeers Piper decided, traveled to the outskirts of the city to a regional animal shelter. The old man's snoring was calming as the driver chuckled loudly into his Bluetooth. The views changed from concrete buildings to open green space and fields of wheat. The letter Piper received a few days before did say it was rural, but this seemed almost impossible. She must have dosed off at some point. She felt the pace of the trip from city to country should have been hours but it passed within seconds.

"Um, driver, where are we going?"

The bus made a turn into an unpaved driveway just off the edge of nowhere. Piper couldn't be sure but she could swear she heard the ocean and saw a gull or two. She swiveled in her chair when she noticed the old man was no longer on the bus. She jumped as the lift was activated and squealed angrily as she was lowered onto a gravel entrance.

Piper watched as the little white bus drove away in a cloud of dust, leaving her and her pack at the door of an elongated barn. She half expected to see a farm hand or worker nearby but only heard the rustle and neighs of horses in the distance. She took in a deep breath and smelled the salty air. The contrast between hay and salt gave her mind a sense of peace and calm. It was much different than the smell of wet pavements and shitty hotdogs she was used to.

"Ms. Wall?"

Piper swiveled in her chair with a bit of difficultly and saw a tall dark man accompanied by a small, white, furry animal. She noticed its abnormally long ears and hint of rust atop of its head. There was a large gold medallion around it's neck that had odd markings on it which Piper assumed was some sort of nametag. Piper also took notice of the dark eyepatch on the handler's eye.

"Must be a new fashion trend going around," she mumbled as he approached her.

"What was that?"

"Oh, nothing," she chuckled, "who is this?"

"This is Starfox," he motioned to the animal who squinted intelligently.

"And I am Nick Fury."

Piper couldn't quite put her finger on it but she could swear she had seen that fox before. There it was again. The feeling. Comfort yet embarrassment, cool and uncollected, fine but miserable. Imperfect. Piper approved.

"Groovy, so what happened to your eye?"

The fox jumped up into Piper's lap and let out a whimpering and amused laugh.


	2. Before New York

Amidst the chaos that happened with events of New York and later Ragnarök the memory of Asgard and its allies glows faint in the eyes of Heimdall, the gate keeper turned wanderer after the fall of Asgard. Heimdall shifted in his seat as he gazed out the window of a greyhound bus traveling across country roads on Midgard. He grunted at the rate of speed he was forced to endure. It was torture enough to be forced onto Midgard but to travel as the mortals do was even slower than the deaths of 1000 dwarf stars stuck in a super nova.

Despite his form moving slowly, his mind was racing with memories of Asgard and its people. One memory stuck out- a wedding that never happened. Everyone on Midgard knows the courtship between the mortal Jane and Thor but none dared to ask to whom the young son of Odin was originally betrothed. It was a rather interesting and puzzling story all at once. This memory is precisely why Heimdall saw it appropriate to seek the woman out.

Heimdall heard from a vagrant that there was a crippled woman living on a ranch with a strange man and his animals. He searched the land with his sight and found that she resembled the goddess from his memory. He also knew that he wouldn't be the only one looking for her, particularly now that things have become more complicated.

The bus chugged along the dirt roads and crawled passed the fields of green and grain. Heimdall kept his eyes covered with blacked out bands matched to a weaved beanie while his mind worked out the last moment he saw the goddess in her glory-far from what she became on Midgard.

"_Heimdall! My love! When was the last time you slept?" the goddess draped her arms around his neck for a hug._

"_I never sleep, your majesty, as Asgard and its allies would be in peril if I should keep one eye torn from such a rare beauty," Heimdall smiled warmly._

"_Any news from my Uncle?" _

"_Nothing yet, but your father sends his regards that he will be tardy to this evenings' ceremony," Heimdall added shortly. _

"_Ah, I see," she hesitated, "and what of my betrothed?" _

_Heimdall turned his head toward the Spectral bridge and took in the moment. The daughter of Freya stood beside him and took in the long moment with him. It was her last few hours as a free goddess. Heimdall knew her heart belonged elsewhere but she wanted to please her father more than anything in the world. Thor was the first in line to receive her hand as he was the first in line for the throne and Asgard was ripe with valuable treasures, such as the Tesseract which was agreed upon in exchange for the mighty Thor's hand in marriage. _

_The goddess seemed unbothered by Thor's overall existence and noticeably unamused by his boasting about Asgard's glory and his father's legacy._

Heimdall grimaced at the memory of Thor's behavior before meeting with the mortal, Jane. He was a true red-blooded god of Asgard who boasted, often pig headedly and heavy with drink, about the victories of Asgard. Perhaps that's why the goddess often sought out conversations with the gatekeeper. She, like Heimdall, was seemingly searching for something deeper in the galaxy.

_She sighed heavily before bidding Heimdall farewell. He offered to accompany her on the walk toward the city, but she insisted on entering alone. _

"_She is a rare beauty, that one, "a snake-like voice crept into the Bifrost. _

"_She is not yours for the taking, Loki," Heimdall added._

"_I'm afraid I don't know what you are talking about," Loki replied shortly. _

"_Do you think me blind?"_

"_Yes! I think the lot of you blind," Loki growled as he kept his back turned away from the bridge. _

Heimdall recalled the first day the goddess met the sons of Odin. She was presented to the King like a gift on a golden holiday. She was accompanied by her mother, Freya of Vanir, and her Uncle Eros of Titan. The three of them walked down the spectral bridge to meet the King and his two sons Loki and Thor at the halfway point from the Bifrost. The walk symbolized the joining of two worlds as allies and the union of two kingdoms in the 9 realms would be sealed at the end of a 9 week courtship- for gods and goddesses it was a period of long celebrations and gift exchanges that ended with a simple ceremony where the betrothed would meet each other at the gates of Asgard to be wed for a lifetime.

_Prior to this day Loki took a special interest in the goddess. Perhaps it was because of her lighthearted nature and fondness for laughter that caught his attention. Heimdall recalled Loki's snickering laughter as a kitten climbed out from under the goddess' dress and drew Thor's blood at the introduction ceremony. _

"_Such a small creature with a fighting spirit! What should we call him?" Thor winced as the kitten hissed. _

"_Fenris?" Loki jested. _

"_I like Bygul," the goddess' mother smiled. _

"_Mother, why don't you take the creature, he seems to be quite fond of you," the young goddess smiled as she plucked the kitten from Thor's grasp._

_Loki rolled his eyes as the three of them gawked at the grey kitten like it was a newborn baby. He meant for it to disrupt the ceremony, not bring everyone together._

_Odin raised an eyebrow toward Loki as he sensed the prank backfired. His disproving yet pleased gaze told Loki that he would not tolerate his jokes for the next nine weeks. Loki shook his head and gazed back at the three 'love drunk' fools only to have his eyes lock with the young goddess. _

_She knew it was a prank gone awry, but she didn't mind and even smiled at Loki. He felt immediate relief from the sickening forced smiles and ceremonious obligations that weighed him down. He felt, for the first time in a while, comfort in the walls of Asgard. Heimdall's gaze locked on this moment as Loki's heart skipped a beat for the first time in his existence. Heimdall felt the moment Loki fell in love with Thor's bride, the goddess of Life's daughter, Sigyn. _

Heimdall shifted once more in his seat as the bus slowed down to a crawl upon entering a narrow driveway. The lasting memories of the 9 weeks Thor was engaged to a woman he never really had a chance with danced like the hula girl on the dash of the bus. Its hips swayed to the rough gravel beneath much like Sigyn's waltz with King Odin the last week of the engagement.

_Loki stared, begrudgingly, out the palace windows as the music blared from all corners of the hall. He didn't want to be apart of this ceremony any longer. He couldn't stand the thought of giving Sigyn away to some pig-headed oaf who only married for sport. He thought of her soft hands leaving his and being placed into the callous clutches of someone who would readily toss her off a cliff if it meant saving Asgard. _

"_Loki, you must respect your brother," Freya of Asgard spoke sweetly. _

"_He doesn't deserve her," Loki howled, "What? What is this for? Some treaty with a man who doesn't even show up to her wedding?" _

"_Loki, your father has decided that this union is what is best for the realms, and for Asgard. He wants what is best for all of us," Freya's words lingered. _

"_For all of us?" Loki paused as a plan began to formulate. _

"_Yes, Loki, for all of us," she smiled as she embraced her son. _

"_You're right mother, its high time someone do something that is best for all of us," Loki's growl turned into a bitter-sweet smile as his mind was made on stealing the Tesseract from the dungeon on Thor's wedding night. _

Heimdall's eyes lifted as the bus came to a stop in front of the dusty barn at the end of the dirt road. He arose from his seat and tossed a gold coin to the driver for safe passage and pressed a finger to his lips. He didn't need anyone else knowing that he had arrived on Midgard to collect the embodiment of life. The driver nodded in silent agreement and bid him farewell. Heimdall walked, alone, down the winding road past the barn.

"_I cannot let you leave Asgard with the Tesseract, Loki," Heimdall stated plainly as he continued to watch Sigyn's stride toward the city._

"_Look's like you have a choice to make Heimdall. Watch the ceremony or stop me from destroying Midgard," Loki sneered._

"_You are the least of Midgard's worries," Heimdall remained focused on Sigyn. _

_Loki grew angry as he unleashed his magic to force open the Bifrost. He held the Tesseract in the air and spun around to Heimdall. _

"_This is your last chance—"Loki was cut off by the arrival of a large air ship that dipped past the Bifrost._

_Heimdall's gaze crossed over to the ship that had maneuvered its way toward Sigyn. The ship swung to its side to reveal a large, muscular being exiting the vessel and touching down to meet with Sigyn. She smiled, respectfully, as she bowed to her father, Thanos of Titan. _

"_As I said, Loki, you are the least of Midgard's worries," Heimdall began to turn to Loki, who had already disappeared from the Bifrost and began his quest to conquer Midgard. _


End file.
